


Don't Do Me Any Favors

by Catchclaw



Category: Captain America (Movies), The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Consensual Infidelity, M/M, Memory Loss, Morning After, Morning Sex, Mutual Pining, Pining
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-05-15
Updated: 2018-05-19
Packaged: 2019-05-07 09:17:30
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 5,151
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14667999
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Catchclaw/pseuds/Catchclaw
Summary: Being in love with your best friend is always a sucker’s bet. But when your best friend is Captain America? You might as well burn your money.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> This started life as [Heart Made of Nickels](https://archiveofourown.org/works/14633202), a seed of the Mental Mimosa series, but now it seems it's determined to be its own thing.

Being in love with your best friend is always a sucker’s bet. But when your best friend is Captain America? You might as well burn your money.

Not to mention that said best friend already has a boyfriend, a paramour, a clinch, and that guy isn’t a jerk or an asshole or a mooch, no; he’s Tony freaking Stark, rich and mostly decent and prone to inappropriate jokes. Also, he’s some kind of professional flying tin man. So there is no way in hell that you’re ever going to say anything about how it is that you feel because you might as well turn your heart into nickels and toss it from the back of a truck: you’ll never get any of it back.

Except then you wake up on a Sunday with Steve Rogers beside you, passed out peacefully in your bed. He’s not wearing a clown nose or anything, no party hat, no mask, so you’re probably not dreaming, but also, key note: he’s not wearing  _anything_.

Oh shit.

How do you know that?

Ah. Because you’re naked, too, and you’re spooned up behind him, your metal arm draped over his hip like it’s nothing. His head’s tipped back against your shoulder and he’s holding your hand, his fingers entwined with yours, and the rest of him may be asleep, but his grip ain’t sleepy at all.

Your cheek’s against his temple and he’s warm, like a stove left on all night. He smells like sweat and good whiskey, like sex and that cologne Tony bought him for Christmas and what in the seven fucking hells is he doing in your bed? He should be upstairs starfished in his own ridiculous bed, a feather-topped fourposter that Tony likes to make inappropriate comments about at team meetings and if things were different, that might make you worry, how ready Tony is sometimes to get Steve to blush, but no matter how red in the face Stevie gets or how hard he glares at Tony for pulling that shit when they’re supposed to be talking about space robots from Mars or something, he always reaches out, too; squeezes Tony’s knee or nips at his shoulder or rubs a big hand over Tony’s thigh, just a touch, just enough that you know there’s no harm done, none that can’t be worked out with the lights off, in the sky blue gossamer sheets that Tony won’t shut up about.

But your bed is nothing like that. It’s just big enough for you and the sheets are just cotton and there’s no one post, much less four. It’s a step up from the bedroll you insisted on sleeping on when Steve first brought you here, introduced you to the compound by saying: “This is home.” You weren’t ready for it, to be around people all day, to have so much freedom. To sleep in such a comfortable bed. So you’d said something to Steve under duress--he can always tell when something’s bothering you, just like when you were kids--and maybe a twisted arm and you’d come back from dinner one night to find the first big fluffy bed gone and a neat, Army-issue bedroll in its place.

You slept better than you had in years. Since you kipped down in a tent in some dark Italian forest with Steve an arm’s length away, snoring the same dumb little snore he’d had since he was five. You’d woken up with a smile on your face and a sense, the very first one, that maybe this whole being back from dead thing was gonna work out all right.

Except now you’re flesh to flesh with him, Steve, and he’s awake enough to turn his head and find your cheek, to kiss it, to whisper your name through a grin big enough to reach Brooklyn, to murmur: “Mornin’ Buck. How’d you sleep?”

 


	2. Chapter 2

“Hmm,” you say. “Funny. Don’t remember closing my eyes.”

He chuckles. “Me, either. Guess that means it was a hell of a party, huh?”

Your nose finds the curve of his neck, the soft skin there, his sigh. “Yeah. Must’ve been.”

There’s something wrong here, there must be, because the universe as a rule doesn’t hand you presents like this, doesn’t give you dreams--for that’s what this is, right? It must be--that are this pleasant, this sweet, this vivid as this is now, with Steve twisting in your arms, curling over you, burying his face, his damn scratchy beard, against your throat, under your ear, before finally, finally, taking your mouth, easy, as if he’s done it a dozen times before, a hundred, as if this isn’t the first kiss you can remember, the first time you’ve had the weight of his tongue between your teeth, the hum of his pleasure slipping over your lips.

You raise your knees and stretch out your arms and trap him against you, on top of you, and the sound he makes when your cocks brush, flushed and already firm, makes you whimper, makes something in you go happily silent and still, rabbit at rest, at last.

“Would you do something for me?”

“Anything,” you say, you mean, you’ve spent your whole life trying to tell him. “Anything, Stevie. Name it.”

He leans back a little, grins in your face, and grinds his hips, the bastard. “Get inside me. I need to feel you again.”

It’s like being shot, the sudden, hot shock of broken flesh. “ _Christ_.”

He kisses you again, ripples his body, somehow, makes you feel every inch where you touch. “Please,” he murmurs, like there’s any argument to be made, any question. “Come on, Buck.”

“Fine,” you get out through tight teeth, “fucking fine, you bossy little shit.”

He laughs, a warm, sinking sound that spreads through your chest like kicked-over molasses. “Don’t do me any favors. If you don’t want to--”

There’s a noise in the air, a tear, and then you’re flying, rearing up and rolling and pinning him on his back, staring into his eyes, drinking in the amusement there, the affection, the plain-out summer heat, and you get a hold of your cock, press the head against him, the promise of a push, of a breach. “If I didn’t want to,” you say, “then I wouldn’t.”

He tips his head back, shows you the sweet turn of his throat. “Oh god.”

It’s better than you’ve ever dreamed before, his body, the way that it’s trembling already, just from this, the way Steve’s chest is ablaze, on fire from somewhere within, and you haven’t even touched the big, warm curve of his dick. He’s wet inside, soft; you can feel it, and it would be so easy to push in, to kiss him hard and shift your hips and take.

“Please,” he says, his palm catching your cheek. “Come on. Don’t tease.”

“Not teasing. Don’t want to hurt you.”

A scramble of his fist in the sheets, a press of plastic against your ribs, cool and smooth. “Here then. Hurry the hell up.”

You do. Two slick fingers for him, a thick slather over yourself, and if it were anybody but Steve, it wouldn’t be enough, no matter how fucked open they were, how much their body held the promise of lovemaking past, but it is Steve, the love of your fucking life and the same kind of scientific freak as you are, bigger stronger faster but in this moment, as you ease in, it feels like you’re both made of glass, delicate parchment. It feel like he can see right through you and you through him and when there is nowhere left to go, when he’s full and you’re shaking and he kisses you, a tender, fleeting brush, it doesn’t matter that this is the first time you can remember fucking him, the first time you remember waking to him in your bed: what matters is that you love him, body and singed fucking soul, and you know, you _know_ , for the first time in your life how much he loves you.

You find each other, his arms around your neck, your fists buried beneath his pillow, and the rhythm, it comes easy, a song you’ve sung a thousand times, even if you only remember this one.

“Fuck me,” he says, soft, over and over. Almost a prayer. “Bucky, please. Please.”

“Right here,” you say, pitching your voice over the bounce of the bed. “I got you.”

He rubs his smile against yours and feeds you every gasp, every wail you kick out of him. “Come in me, baby," he whispers. "Mess me up.”

His words kick down the last door, shake loose your grip on the reins, and you lose track of time, of your senses, of everything except the places where his body meets yours, the smell of his skin, and when you come, it’s like being swallowed, subsumed into something so much bigger than yourself, something warm and deep and wide.

You rear back, let your metal arm take the weight, and watch his face while you sputter, while the heat of him, the sweet, pulls out every last gasp. The look in his eyes, the jut of his mouth--proud, furious, hot--they make you want to stay buried in him, to stay joined, to stiffen inside and fuck him all over again.

His hand fumbles to his cock, clutches, and you stroke the insides of his thighs while he does it, jerks himself like a fucking teenager, like the kid he was once, the lover that might have been.

“That’s right,” you tell him, “that’s right. Look how pretty you are. Look how close.”

He loses his breath for a second, arches up, pushes back on your dick. “Bucky. _Buck_ , oh fuck. Talk to me. Love your voice. Let me hear it.”

“Bossy,” you say. “Always telling everybody what to do. But you should see yourself right now, Stevie. So desperate for it. So desperate to come all over yourself, aren’t you?”

He groans, his free hand snakes around your forearm, the metal one, his whole body shaking. “Fuck yes.”

“Didn’t get enough last night, huh? That wasn’t enough for you?”

“Oh, god. No. _No_.” His fist picks up. “No, needed that. Needed you.”

You pitch over, rub your mouth against his. “You did, huh?”

“Needed you both so bad. So fucking bad, Bucky. You don’t know how long that I’ve--”

_Both_? Your brain is fuzzy, sense sucked dry by sex, and in the moment, with Steve right there, hanging, his tongue tracing your lips, you can’t be bothered to think. “Greedy, aren’t you? Hmmm? Have to have it now, when you want it. Everybody else’s wants be damned.”

His wrist is in overdrive, accelerating, and you can feel the desperation in him, the need.

“Your stripes make you hot, Cap? You get off on that, bossing everybody around, huh?”

“Not everybody,” he pants, “just you two. Oh, god, please. Please.”

You nuzzle his ear. “Please what, baby?”

A shudder, a hot, formless sigh. “Kiss me. Kiss me, fuck. I’m gonna come.”

You do as he asks, of course you do, and when your tongues touch, there’s heat between you, a jerk, a fat spurt, and that makes you kiss him harder, deeper, sweet.

“Well,” somebody says, a hand on your back, a scratch of nails over your shoulder. “There you are. I wondered where you all wandered off to.”

You startle even as Steve’s mouth goes soft, his legs around your waist falling lazy. “Hey, Tony,” he says, turning his head towards the voice. “We were just talking about you.”


	3. Chapter 3

“Yeah, well, no need to talk now, fellas." Tony’s fingers find your hair, slide in like it’s their right. "You’ve got the real thing, in the flesh.” He tugs your head up a touch and for a second you think he’s gonna hit you but the look on his face is flushed and feral and he tastes that way, too, hot and a little off center, like a globe that’s rolled off its axis. The angle is odd, the circumstances more so, but it’s a good kiss, solid and slick. He knows how hard to pull your hair, how firm he can bite, how fast to feed you his tongue--it feels like you’ve done this before, let Steve’s boyfriend ravage your mouth, and he’s apparently fine with finding Steve under you, shaking, and if you weren’t half hard again and Steve wasn’t groaning, you’d be more unnerved by it, how good it feels to kiss Tony Stark.

“Yeah, hello, hi,” Tony says, the words reed thin, out of breath. “Goddamn, Barnes. Good morning to you, too.”

You squint at him, stare. He’s wearing plaid pajama pants. No shirt. His hair’s mess, his face kneaded with sleep,  and there are hickeys on his throat, twin chains of red that meet in the middle. He’s a hell of a sight.

“Hey,” Steve says, impatient, and Tony laughs, goes easy to his knees.

“I didn’t forget about you, Captain Impatient. Sheesh.”

Steve arches his neck and reaches for Tony’s. “Can it. C’mere.”

You’ve spent the last six months not watching them kiss, doing your damnedest to turn away when they do, trying so hard not to stare, and now, it’s like they want you to, like you’re supposed to, and now you’re the one groaning, the one who feels itchy, the one who’s stiffening at the sight of what you’ve been missing, of what you haven’t been able to have.

Coming back like you did, in the middle of their story, there were whole chapters of Steve’s life you didn’t know, hadn’t read; never mind that they had their own language, one that shut everybody else in the world out. Not just you. Though god, it felt that way. You’d always been at Steve’s side, always, even if it wasn’t how you wanted it, even if it wasn’t love. Not the two-way street kind. So to step back into the light, the land of the living, to find Steve there waiting but with your place taken, held down by a smartass more worldly, more wordy than you’d ever been was bad enough, but to see that he’d done you one better, this Stark, this pencil-sketch of Howard’s come to life, he’d accomplished what you never could: he’d convinced Steve to give him his heart. Oh, that’d stung. That’d fucking cut you to the quick, the core of you hollowed out, nothing left in your gut but the stars.

They ascribed it to the culture shock, your silence, your sullen, your insistance on lingering in the shadows: corners of rooms, edges of tables; the background, it was yours, those first few months. Always.

You’d had to teach yourself to ease back into Steve’s life slowly. One step at a time. He wanted you to jump in full force--hand outstretched, that big, familiar grin--of course he did, but no, no. You couldn’t do that. You did it your own way, bit by bit.

And now, somehow, the universe has smiled upon you and Steve’s in your bed, beneath you, kissing Stark like he’s starving and clutching you, holding you inside of him, tight, and is it any fucking wonder that you find yourself moving again, swelling again, driving again into the man that you’ve loved your whole life, even through the years you can’t remember, the horrors you can’t forget.

You stroke his stomach and draw out of him, in, out again, in, and in front of you, their  kiss crumbles, Steve’s head snapping back with a gasp.

“Bucky,” he hisses, like he’s broken, like he can’t get enough. “Jesus. Fuck.”

Tony turns to you, grinning, preening almost, a peacock. Fucking proud. “Now that,” he said, “is fucking gorgeous. You are. You two.” He leans over and kisses you again, gentle. A brush of heat on your cheek. Whispers: “Hey, Buck.”

“Hey,” you make your mouth say.

“Will you do something for me?”

Steve lifts his hips, draws you in deeper, a crack of thunder at the back of his throat, and it’s hard to think, to see, just to breathe. “Will I--?”

“Let’s turn him over,” Tony says, louder now, deliberate. “Put him on his belly, huh, then lift him back into your lap.”

“Yeah?”

“Yeah.” He’s holding your hair again, fingers wound tight, the other hand tangled in Steve’s--a human conductor, electric, carrying the energy between the two of you, between all of you. He lowers his voice, bourbon at the bottom of the bottle. “I’m gonna get my mouth on you, sweetheart, while Bucky and his pretty cock make you come. How’s that sound?”

Steve keens and the light crackles--clothes shed and bodies twisted, navigating the narrow channel of the bed, and then you’re pitched back on your haunches, Steve’s back against your chest, his thighs spread across yours, facing the edge of the bed. You’re holding his hands as you fuck him, knuckles wound tight, turning white, and your chin’s perched on his shoulder, watching Tony lap at Steve’s cock with his long, ardent tongue. Stark’s on the floor still, knees kissing carpet, and the look he’s giving you, the smile--shit, it’s a flamethrower. Makes you feel like you’re made of newspaper and Steve is gasoline and between the three of you there’ll only be fire.

Steve is out of it; his eyes closed, clamped shut, like to see would be too much with all that he’s feeling, all that you’re doing to him. His mouth is moving, though, urgent, except there aren’t any words left. Just sound. Bullets in a tin can. Staccato. Punched out of him with every breath.

Tony’s palms are caught inside of Steve’s thighs, pushing him back against you, and even though Tony’s not touching you, it feels like he is because you can feel every twitch of Steve’s body, every sensation; sense each tremble, each gasp. You’re so close, the three of you, tied together by touch, by desire, by a spark of something that’s more.

“Steve,” you say to him, sweet. Like you’ve always wanted to. Like you’ve whispered in dreams. “Good, baby. That’s right. Take it. You’re doing so good.”

He cries out, a shimmer of sound, and lifts himself towards Tony’s mouth, shoves back against you. A butterfly pinned, determined to pull his own weight.

“Right,” you mutter. “That’s right. Take what you want, just like that. Show us what you need.”

Tony lifts up his head, lips heavy red, his dark eyes lit up like candy. “God, Barnes,” he rasps, “don’t encourage him.” He smacks the inside of Steve’s thigh, a sting. “Always gotta be like that, don’t you, Cap? Can’t ever take your grip from the reins.”

Steve rears up, hissing, and your fingers slip down his chest, his skin slick with spunk and sweat. He’s moving faster, determined--what did Tony call him? _Impatient_. Yeah. You wonder if he’s always like this, so openly needy. God, you hope so.

Stark’s chuckling, a sound you can feel in your teeth, and then he shifts, quick like a cat, and, oh, you can feel when he swallows Steve down, when Steve has nowhere left to go, nothing to do but fuck and be fucked, and when your hand finds Tony’s head, grinds your gears in his hair, holds him there, Steve starts to shake like a car with bad brakes and moans, deep sweet and forever, and you stop holding on, stop holding back, let yourself go. Let your hips fly.

Tony, fuck, Tony, he takes it without missing a beat and reaches back, rakes his nails down your thigh and that gets your groaning, a sound you can’t swallow, can’t stop. Steve’s clawing at your arm, the one clamped around his waist, clinging to you for dear life, and that would be bad enough, hard enough to resist--how fragile he feels, this beautiful man; a paper doll on the head of a pin. But then, oh then, then he kisses you, his sweet teeth across your cheek, and he whispers: “I love you. Love you, Buck. Oh fuck, I do.”

And you light into him. Come. Your skin warmer than it’s ever been, your heart bigger, your head lighter, like a feather fast, floating, and you kiss him, breathe into his mouth and feel his lips lift when he loses it, grins as he lets go, as he holds onto you, his shoulders shaking with pleasure, with joy, with a need named and at last fulfilled.

“I should’ve said it a thousand times,” he says, the words like battered ribbons. “I meant to. I wanted. But I couldn’t let them in my mouth, couldn’t think ‘em, because I knew once I said them, I’d never stop. And it wasn’t--I couldn’t, then.”

You kiss him to say you understand, that you’re not angry, that you’re grateful the fates have given you both this: a second chance.

“Hey,” Tony says, close, his mouth chasing up your neck, planting a rose. “Hallmark granddads. Enough with the treacle. Need some help over here, huh?”

He kisses you first, lets you lick Steve from his tongue while Steve nuzzles your throat, feeds your skin whispers, hums when Tony makes you moan. Then he tips over, teeters, and sighs into Steve’s mouth, and it takes you a moment to realize he’s got his cock in his hand, plaid shoved down his hips as he works himself fast and free.

“Stevie,” you murmur.  Turn the word into Steve’s hair, snake a hand up Tony’s back and hold on to him. Hang out. “Go on, touch him. Look how ready he is for you.”

Tony laughs, breathless. “Yeah, Stevie,” he says, “come on.”

Steve echoes him, laughs, the soft one that you remember from darkness in Brooklyn, from a ramshackle room with two beds. Narrow, like this one, and it feels so much like _home_ , this space hung between the three of you, and how that’s possible, you have no earthly idea but hell, so much of this strange new world seems nonsensical. Impossible. Electric cars and phones not plugged into walls and aliens who can crack open the sky. Maybe this, you and Steve and Tony, isn’t so different.

Steve turns his head and finds your mouth, sinks in with a grin. Says: “Fine, I’ll touch him,” he says. “But that means you’ve gotta kiss him. Otherwise, he’ll wake up the whole house.”

Tony comes in Steve’s fist like a flashfire, his mouth shoved against yours, one hand singed to your hip and the other clawing at Steve’s ribs, his chest. He swears when he comes--Steve was right--lets out a maelstrom of profanity that you can’t quite muffle and tries to fall over; his knees give in, still pinned to the floor, and it takes both of you to keep him upright.

A long shadow, a sigh, and you find yourself in a warm, sticky heap, Tony hauled up between you, all of you lying sideways on the bed, three pairs of legs hanging over the side. Somehow, you end up in the middle, Steve pressed to one side, Tony curled sleepy against the other, and it’s only then that the hows and the why creep up on you, worm their way past the happy and turn like screws in your brain.

You have to know. You may not like the answer, but you have to ask.

“Can I ask you something?” you say, fingers fast over Tony’s back.

“You who?” Tony says. “Me?”

“Either one. Both.”

Steve kisses the cage of your shoulder, the rough place where metal meets flesh. “‘Course.”

You take a breath, risk it. “How the fuck did this happen?”


	4. Chapter 4

“How did what happen, Buck?”

“Steve, how did, I mean”--you fumble, feel heat in your cheeks, feel like a damn fool--“did one of you lose a bet? Is that why you did this? Do you all feel sorry for me?”

It’s quiet for a minute, eerie still, and then they both sit up, parallel affronted lines, their faces twin pictures of shock.

“What the fucking fuck, Barnes?” Tony says, the same time that Steve says: “God, Bucky, what the hell are you talking about?”

You hide your eyes behind your hand. “Look, I know I sound like an idiot, but I’m genuinely asking, ok? I don’t, ah, remember what happened last night.”

“You don’t--?” Tony sputters, surprise blooming into a laugh. “Seriously? I think I’m insulted.”

“Tony,” Steve sighs.

“No, I know I’m insulted. That, my friend, the thing you’re not remembering? It was amazing. Transformative. Dare I say, mind blowing.”

“Please don’t,” Steve says.

“And you don’t remember any of it?” A warm grip on your wrist, a tug, and you open your eyes, see Tony bent over you, his expression a lot softer than his voice. “Come on, Barnes. Really?”

“Really.”

“What, did your brain revert to the mainframe or something?”

Steve bumps his shoulder, smooths a hand through your hair. “Tony. You’re not helping.”

“It’s ok,” you say. “Maybe he’s right. I don’t know.”

Steve says: “What do you remember?”

You chew your cheek, think. “I remember the beginning of the party, I guess. The awful music. Me kicking Barton’s ass flat out at pool.”

“Yeah,” Tony says. “I won a hundred bucks on your side shot.”

“I had a drink or two.” You remember the weight of the glass in your hand, the sweet smell of smashed cherries that wafted up, stung your nose with each sip. “Ran away from Nat when she tried to make me dance.”

Steve makes a face. “Tell me about it. She corned me instead.”

“There are pictures,” Tony says. “Lots of ‘em. Don’t worry. Believe me, you’ll wish you could forget it."

You lean into Steve’s hand, the curve of Tony’s body. “And then, I don’t know. I had to hide. Snuck out onto the balcony with Thor and had another drink. Maybe two? Then it, uh. Gets sort of blurry.”

“The balcony, huh?” Steve says, thoughtful. “That’s the last thing you remember?”

“Yeah,” you say, “you know, the one off the kitchen that looks out over the trees. Perfect place for a smoke. If I still did.”

“Well,” Tony says, “you know what’s funny--funny? Is funny the word I’m looking for? Yeah--is that me and Steve found you out there, on said non-smoking balcony, no Thor in sight, but you, you my friend, were in a very good place.”

“What?”

“You were a little tipsy,” Steve says. “Feelin’ swell about the world and everything. I thought you were just having a good time.”

Your brain’s having a hard time getting this. “Huh?”

Tony smirks, spreads a clever hand over your heart. “But let me take a wild guess: you let Thor pour the drinks, didn’t you?"

You can see the god’s smile, the one that makes him look more like a kid than an immortal. The flash of a flask, of a glass. “Yeah, but I can’t get drunk. Believe me, Tony. I’ve tried.”

“Whatever he gave you is made for gods, Buck,” Steve says. “The Aesir. It’s not fit for humans, even the super soldier kind. It’s kind of a thing with him at parties. Like a practical joke, I guess: watch the puny mortals pass out and puke on the floor. I should’ve warned you.”

Tony says: “Ah, but see? See? This totally fucking explains what you said when we found you, all happy-go-lucky out there.”

You wince. “Oh, fuck. What’d I say?”

Tony’s smirk turns all the way up. “You came right up to me, Barnes, bold as Army brass, and asked if you could lay one my boyfriend.”

Your mouth is all gape. No sound will come out.

“Back me up, Rogers. Am I lying?”

Steve’s smile breaks out, far and fond. “He’s not."

“I can’t fucking believe that.”

Tony shrugs. “Well, color me surprised, too. I didn’t think you had it in you.”

“And you said yes?”

“No,” Tony says, “I said hell yes, please do, because if I have to listen to Steve pine over you for one more goddamn day, then I’m gonna say fuck it and kiss the shit out of you myself.”

There’s so much in that sentence to process that your brain hurts, that you have to close your eyes again to make room for it instead your head. “So I--?”

Steve ducks down and smothers the question, gives you the answer instead. “Yeah,” he says after a minute, his beard biting at your chin. “You did.”

Tony nudges him away and takes your mouth, grins against you, heavy and sweet. “And then,” he says, “I was the hero of the hour, thank you, because got you smoochy idiots by the collar and dragged you upstairs and threw you into my bed.”

A shadow of flesh, the hum of two mouths. Tony’s voice in your ear as you ease into Steve, telling you what Steve wants, how he likes it. Whispering about how beautiful you are, how strong, how good.

You say: “We made room for you too, didn’t we?”

“You did.” Another kiss, pleased. “You remember that?”

“A little.”

“Only a little?” Tony says.“Now that is a goddamn fucking shame.”

“But wait. How’d we end up in my room?”

Steve snorts, rubs the sound against your neck. “Tony threw us out.”

“Hey, not my fault you were tossing and turning, jolly Green Giant! Both of you. It was either kick you out or stab you. Close call. Be glad I went with option A.”

It’s quiet for a moment, the kind of quiet that hums in your ears. Sounds like the whole compound is still sleeping, except for you.

Steve’s smile has faded, a flag left out in the rain. And his eyes are twisted now wound up in worry. “God,” he says, “I hope we didn’t take advantage of you, Buck. I mean, you just seemed really, really happy. I don’t know. We had no idea you were drunk. But still, I should have--I mean, you were acting so strangely, we should’ve--”

You sit up and shut him up with a kiss, one that says I understand, one that says you’re not angry, one that says you’re grateful the fates have given all three of you this: a second chance.

“Tell you what,” you say to the love of your life, to a man making a strong case to be the second, “why don’t you take me back upstairs and see if you can’t jog my memory. Or maybe, even better: help me make some new ones.”

“You,” Tony says, nuzzling the curve of your shoulder, “are a genius, Barnes. Cheesy as hell, but a genius.”

“And tomorrow,” you say, “you’re buying me a bigger bed.”


End file.
